We end, as all good stories do, on the 30th December, early in the morning.

There's a little time left for some characterization of Dorothy, who clings to family in the face of tragedy. No real progress, and Nick couldn't take her away from all this. The book closes on how the act of murder gets drowned in business of other people's lives, like a nuke in the ocean getting swept away.

The real meat of this section is the big explanation to Nora, with asides to future events. It is interesting, and next year maybe I'll do a big timeline of events, but i want to focus here on Nick's dismissal of investigation by mathematics.

With so many events being relayed to Nick by testimony, of near and ancient events, Nick can get a lot of varying accounts and analyses of events and people. Add in perennial liars, and vested interests, like Mimi, Nunheim, Morelli, Gilbert even, and there seems to be very little facts to hang on to.

The solution to this evil demon of unreliable witnesses? Trust the cops, it feels like. Guild is never doubted, Andy, the red headed brute, is never doubted, and Nick's solve is not doubted, the institution of justice follows up on his assertions, and gathers up the rest of the evidence. Its not logically airtight, and perhaps one of the more gruesome assertions, that one of the victims was dissected, is never proven, the only blood being detected was animal blood.

In keeping with the sardonic, laconic Nick, the justice of this tale is mostly about whatever you can get. It is 'pretty unsatisfactory'.

Conclusion

I read this book very Christmas, doing my best to keep up each day. I would read it on the train home and used to have a years old train ticket as my bookmark. The tickets gone now, but the affection remains.

I've enjoyed recording some thoughts and words about it. I am prone to aimlessly going through it without any rumination. Its been so many years, that I just enjoy the rhythms of the book, the switching of locales and characters, the brief jaunt to the frozen past.

If anyone does read this, I hope I haven't spoiled anything too bad, and I hope you enjoy your detective fiction. Happy holidays.

Nick is a tired tired bear by the end of the 29th. It starts early, ends late, and contains the dramatic conclusion to the two strands of this story.

The Wynant-Jorgensen saga culminates in a late night brawl, as Nora appears to supersede Mimi's position as care giver and guardian to Dorothy. A fit, or episode of some sort fully takes over Mimi until she is brought back to stability.

As I read it this time, I noticed Nora's reaction, with her eyes black with anger, and face set. Nora's faced dangerous situations through out the story, but this seems like the one thats rattled her the most. I suppose the world of crime wasn't as viscerally present as a fancy person's home that they've visited before? Its a bleak tableau, as Mimi rocks away as the Charleses leave.

The next big moment for me was Gilbert's faltering from his wounds. He's trying to be his own person, but he is quite literally damaged by the schemes of his parents and the general generation before him, and it traps him in the Jorgensen household, at least for now.

But the other big strand is, y'know, the moider and its resultant investigation. The lies, planted evidence, letters and cab chases all amount to a lot, and I'm sure there's a lot to be said about it. I think there's something to be said about respect, and what the act of withholding information conveys. It pops up everywhere, with Alice Quinn, with Guild, with Macaulay, and with a foil for everyone else, Mimi. She's like a lying tornado that adds a little hazard to the Mario Kart course that is New York City.

The crime is solved here, and I hope that Nick gets a nice lie in and early night in as well. There's the last bit tomorrow, and we'll see how Hammett wraps everything up.

A busy busy day, really full of going to people's houses and talking. But with a real look at the women attached to the hapless boundary pushers.

Miriam, all dressed in pink, has a sort of respect for what criminals are, and resents how Art is betraying both law abiders and law revilers, not to mention his philandering hopes.

Alice Quinn, forlornly believing in staying in a marriage for the money, bitter and weary as her husband drinks and runs about with younger women. Perhaps a vision of Miriam's future, a reflection in another echelon of society.

But the real monsters, despite the madhouse of the pig iron club, are the Wynants, calculating, recalibrating, and scheming, by god always scheming! I like seeing how Mimi is divided into Gil and Dorry. The helplessness, bright blue eyes beseeching as they try to accomplish their respective goals. The sociopathic reduction of other people into objects of investigation and manipulation.

Navigating all this is tiring, and its so much data and viewpoints to hold in one's brain. I can see why Nick just wants to sit down, drink something and eat a Ruben sandwich.

Hefty data in this day, a bunch of people finding things out for Nick, and then quoting exactly what they know to him.

The Packer segment always intrigued me when I first read it, because I thought: we have the Wynant siblings together for the first time, but we are interrupting this for a wild west segment of cannibalism in the snow? Why?

I guess it's an illustration of lying about one's actions, even as they are discovered in the midst of new crimes. Its thematic, in a grisly way. I wonder if it was just a meme of Hammett's day, or if he liked researching celebrated crimes. Probably the latter, as he was a crime writer and ex detective.

Studsy and the Pig-Iron club remains a favorite, this tough old brick of a man running a little speakeasy, talking to wanted men and serving bad champagne, what a way to live. I forget that it is seen empty at first, and they can have a normal conversing.

Similar to Packer, there is historical violence brought to mind, but its of a more sporting nature, the offer to duel again, with similar constraints, there is the respect between the two.

Its all done through pregnant pauses of silent understanding, but Art Nunheim being outed as a rat to the underworld seems almost like Nick heartlessly signing a death warrant. Perhaps its a spiteful revenge for sending Morello his way. A lack of respect, unlike Studsy.